"Different-abled or Dis-Abled?

BBC - Ouch! Disability Magazine - News, Paralympics, Features, Humour
I mentioned in Saturday's posting how I feel deeply affected when I see folk with Downs Syndrome. However, I was hesitating over my words even as I started to write this paragraph. How easily we label people- but should we? Every human being has so many other qualities, ability and potential beyond that which is immediately apparent to the eyes of those who take for granted the gift of all our senses including sight-and I speak as one who has not had 20/20 vision since the age of 14 and wears glasses most of the time now.

Fortunately, my "disability" is not one that merits any comment from anyone really, and I would certainly not call myself disabled in that sense. A sizeable proportion of the population have to wear spectacles at one stage or other, particularly after a certain age. So nobody would know that part of me is 64 years older than the rest as I have a donated cornea in my left eye, unless I choose to tell them(OK,I have now, haven't "eye"!)

My dear younger brother was boasting in a gentle way the other week that when he had a sight test as part of a work medical, he even read out the maker's name at the bottom of the chart! As he's only eighteen months younger than me though, I expect he'll be needing his fair share of manufactured assistance with reading the small print before long, I'm sure. It comes to us all, though our Mum seems to have managed amazingly well without glasses for close work well into these later years.

I wonder who first came up with the word "disabled"? I'll bet it was an able-bodied person, but I'll also wager they never stopped to realise that they too are actually disabled and so is everyone else in the world. Whether by accident of birth, accidental trauma or simply lacking certain skills others have, none of us have perfect abilities in all things. I'll never be a Rembrandt or a Rooney (Wayne of that ilk, wunderkind of Manchester United)so I'm dis-abled from being a great painter or football player- in the latter case as much by the arrival of middle age as the absence of Rooney's beautiful boots!

However, in God's sight, I already am perfect, because he has made me so, as indeed he has every reader of these thoughts. Every human being is made in his image, whatever their abilities or apparent lack of them. We are not written off as seconds, but restored to our full function through history's pivot, one marvellous sacrifice made not for sporting glory but for human liberation, something far more lasting. Therefore, logically and faithfully, everyone has the ability to do something far greater than their most paralysing of disabilities allow. To each individual, our creator has given unique gifts- and yet it's part of the wonderful topsy turvy grace of God that sometimes those who seem to have the least actually have the most. The first shall be last and the last shall be first is the Lord's order of play, which would make for some very interesting if confusing medal awards at Olympic or Paralympic games!

I've been thinking a lot about the marginalised members of our society tonight as I watched three wonderful BBC Two features which all in different ways addressed disabilities. I was drawn to this web page as a link from the last of them; it had one of the longest, most intriguing titles I've heard in a long time. It was called The Robinsons at Wit's End: This is my Family, and is the second in a wonderfully life-affirming series of Tuesday documentaries. Unfortunately, I missed the first half hour or so of the programme as my forty winks turned into eighty, so it was only after following the link that I learnt the full extent of the pain and sorrow this wonderful family have endured alongside all the joys of being a home of love to six beautiful children, five of whom have special needs or "learning difficulties". Sometimes politically correct labels can do more harm than good, but I think both these descriptions well serve the wonderful young individuals this programme featured.

The narrator of the programme was 13-year old Debra, the only one of the adopted Robinson children without recognised medical or social difficulties. The part of the programme I saw focussed on her entry to teenagerdom and her loving Mum's efforts to help her into the minefield of adolescence while avoiding the temptation to wrap her in cotton wool as she understandably does with the others. Yet each of the other children, particularly young Tish who is of a similar age but had endured a dreadful early childhood, all had something really special to contribute. Her insights, her trust, her unaffected words of appreciation for each of her teachers at her "ordinary" comprehensive in Honiton, Devon, all spoke volumes to me of where Jesus the Saviour, God the loving Father and the Holy Spirit can most often be seen hard at work, yet so often untrumpeted.

I don't know whether this family hold any beliefs at all but for me God was surely evident in this gem of a programme. I hope it gets an early repeat so I can see the rest of it. Isn't it interesting how the most striking parts of the gospel, and the people Jesus paid most attention to, were those who were the least able in 1st Century eyes: those who were disabled through prejudice or the ignorance of others from standing up to the neglect and pretensions of the religious hierarchy of the time.

These characters in scripture to me, were in some ways just like the Robinson children, growing up in an often cruel world which is not so very different from ancient Palestine. Their loving mother understandably fears for them, just as parents of disabled and sick children brought their loved ones to Jesus. He came to bring hope and release the true abilities of all who bore such chronic burdens, of many kinds-adults as well as children, whether those burdens were physical, mental or spiritual. He healed and helped those who were "disabled" through no fault of their own. He still comes today, but now he heals and works through us. He challenges us to see the world differently through eyes of faith. Thank heavens for that: as scripture says, "I can do all things through Christ".

This evening too challenged some of my ignorance of disability issues; maybe it's time for it be at least an optional subject on the national curriculum. For instance, after being somewhat confused by the classification system of athlete's disabilities, I came across a website which clarified something which had been puzzling me. A person can be termed a quadraplegic, even if he or she still has some use of their limbs- it all depends on which part of the spinal cord is affected. In other words, they are not necessarily paralysed, which makes the excellently-written editorial to this website, "Ouch" seem all the more relevant.

Mind you, I can't quite understand how the current games can be regarded as "parallel" when the main Olympics finished three weeks ago. Surely something which is parallel happens at the same time, as in a parallel universe? Semantics maybe, but the issue is confused enough- let's not make it more so.

At the end of the International Day of Peace (21st September) here's to a world in which even the greatest disability of all, our inability to love one another as God has loved us, can lead us to the heavenly podium of the victor.